Tools Don’t Build Masterpieces, People Do… With Tools

I seem to be on a CVI kick, so let’s go back to my comment a couple weeks ago about the CVI being a tool. I recently asked a group what they thought of the CVI. The first person to respond said, “I think it’s crap, a waste of our time.”

“Wholesale & completely?” I asked.

“Maybe not wholesale and completely, but yeah, pretty much.”

Suddenly, heads started nodding. Some people thought it was absolutely amazing — but the general consensus among much of the room was that it was OK at best.

“Oh, thank God,” I said. “Thanks for getting that out of the way so early. I almost completely agree with you. I’ve resisted assessments my entire career because my general thought of assessments is that they’re boxes. Once someone knows your ‘color,’ your ‘letters’ it’s too easy to put you a box and say ‘now I know you’, but they don’t. They only know an idea of you. One tiny thing among countless other things.

“I use the CVI as a tool, not an answer,” I told them. “A tool to help us ask the bigger, better question. And then, when we have conflict, we’ll pull out the CVI and see if that tool helps us again. If it does, cool. If not, put it away.”

It’s a tool.

The beautiful part about a tool is, the tool’s not the product. The tool’s what you use to build the product. We get a chop saw in order to create bookshelves and homes. But it’s just a tool; it’s not the shelves or the house itself. For me, that’s an empowering reality of the CVI. It’s a tool to build better engagement, to turn dysfunctional teams into functioning ones, to help people show up in more powerful, positive ways, to give people a tool to take control of their life and responses and behavior in challenging and difficult situations. If people can get your goat, if you find yourself reacting more than responding to difficult people, if you think to yourself that you would like to engage in a situation if you just knew how to inject yourself in a positive and effective way, then it’s highly likely you would benefit from learning how to use this tool. Like learning to use a pen, or a computer or a car, it does nothing without you. It’s idle until you pick it up, turn it on, or get behind the wheel.

Tools are designed to help us be better, faster, more efficient, more precise, more consistent, more effective…and to help us build masterpieces. That’s the gift of the CVI. Wanna take it for a spin?

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About Steven Fulmer

I have achieved almost every dream I set my mind to, including being the first in my family to graduate from college, becoming a VP by 35, driving across the country, learning to fly an airplane, skiing in the Alps, learning to sail, owning a sailboat, traveling to Russia, falling deeply in love, creating a beautiful family, and identifying my life purpose, to name but a few.